The Man Who Would Be King - Softcover

Kipling, Rudyard; Rudyard Kipling, Kipling; Rudyard Kipling

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1594626324 ISBN 13: 9781594626326

Publisher: Book Jungle, 2007

Synopsis

"The Man Who Would Be King" (1888) is a short story by Rudyard Kipling. It is about two British adventurers in British India who become kings of Kafiristan, a remote part of Afghanistan. The story was inspired by the exploits of James Brooke, an Englishman who became the first White Rajah of Sarawak in Borneo; and by the travels of American adventurer Josiah Harlan, who was granted the title Prince of Ghor in perpetuity for himself and his descendants. It incorporates a number of other factual elements such as locating the story in eastern Afghanistan's Kafiristan and the European-like appearance of many of Kafiristan's Nuristani people, and an ending modelled on explorer Adolf Schlagintweit. The story was first published in The Phantom Rickshaw and other Eerie Tales (1888). It also appeared in Wee Willie Winkie and Other Child Stories (1895), and in numerous later editions of that collection. It has been adapted for other media a number of times.

About this title

About the Author

Rudyard Kipling was born on 30 December 1865 in Bombay, British India, to British parents who had met and married in England two years earlier. Kipling spent his early years in India but was sent to England for his education. In October 1882, he arrived back in India not yet 17 and, lacking the money to continue his education, got a job working for newspapers such as the Civil and Military Gazette in Lahore and The Pioneer in Allahabad. He wrote a huge number of stories and articles during ten years of working for newspapers. In 1888, he published his first book, “Plain Tales from the Hills” published in Calcutta in January 1888, which consisted of 40 short stories he had written for the newspapers. He published and sold several other stories the same year, one of which was this story “The Man Who Would Be King”, which became one of his most famous. On 9 March 1889, Kipling left India, traveling first to San Francisco via Rangoon, Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan. He then traveled across the United States and Canada, meeting Mark Twain in Elmira, New York. After that, he traveled to Liverpool England, then to India again, then back to England where he married, then went to Brattleboro, Vermont, then to Japan, then back to Brattleboro, Vermont, where his first child was born in December 1892 and he settled down to writing his Jungle Books. Kipling became a Freemason in about 1885, before the usual minimum age of 21. Freemasonry plays an important role in several of his works especially in “The Man Who Would Be King” where he discovers that the High Priest of Kafirstan is a Freemasons too!!! After four years in Battleboro, he returned to England due to a dispute with his brother-in-law. He then went to South Africa where he spent some years before returning to England. During all his life until his death in England on 18 January 1936 at age 70, Kipling kept writing and publishing. He left a huge volume of work. For example, more than 50 unpublished poems by Kipling were released for the first time in March 2013.

Review

.,."a great resource for teaching the older British writers." -- J.M. Soling

About this edition

• Publisher: Book Jungle
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 1594626324
• ISBN 13: 9781594626326
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 144